How to Become a Master Gardener

Master Gardeners are adult volunteers recruited and trained by county extension agents and University of Florida specialists to provide assistance in Extension home horticultural programs. Through this program, enthusiastic gardeners study such areas as botany, horticulture, soil science, and plant and insect identification and management.

Master Gardeners take a 13 week course starting in May. In April, an essential pre-course meeting ("Getting to Know What it Means to be a Volunteer Florida Master Gardener") must be attended. The course is only offered once a year because it is so intensive and requires a huge commitment in time from our instructors. At the end of the course, students must pass a rigorous final exam.

After successfully completing the training program, Master Gardeners teach and promote environmental action--awareness and wise use of resources as well as reduced chemical, water and energy usage. They conduct gardening clinics at malls, write about gardening for local newspapers, speak in clubs, libraries and schools, answer phone questions, and conduct demonstration gardens at fairs.

The Florida Master Gardener Program is administered by the Cooperative Extension Service, a part of the University of Florida's Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences. This instruction gives the MGs a good background to prepare them for the wide variety of questions they will face as volunteers at plant clinics, giving talks, answering phones, and in the other duties they undertake in interactions with the public on behalf of the Extension. MGs volunteer 50 hours per year for the Extension and take at least 8 hours of continuing education classes every year. This may seem like a lot, but many of our MGs turn in twice that! The hours don't matter much when you're doing what you love.

Benefits of Being a Master Gardener

Help to educate yourself and your community
Help gardeners solve their plant problems
Promote environmental awareness and responsibility of water conservation, fertilizaiton, and least-toxic pest control
Beautify Florida by teaching about appropriate plants for our climate
Work with school and community gardens
Fun and Friendship
Work with some of the most talented and interesting gardeners in the area
Participate in team projects
Take on leadership roles
Improve the efficiency of the Extension Service through proactive programs
Extending practical applications of UF/IFAS based research on gardening in Florida
Learning and sharing principles and practices of Florida-friendly horticulture
Serving as ambassadors of goodwill for Pasco County and the State of Florida

Requirements of Master Gardener Volunteers

Commitment to volunteering 50 hours a year and willingness to share gardening information with people of Pasco County
Time to spend volunteering and attending monthly meetings, field trips and training sessions
Love of gardening and the desire to learn and practice Florida-friendly horticulture methods and to share this information with others.
Eagerness to learn Florida horticulture by active participation in the intensive Master Gardener Training Course and commitment to learning via continuing education activities required to maintain certification

Training and Certification

If you are accepted into the Master Gardener Training Program you will receive 78 hours of horticultural training in a 13 week course. The fee covers educational books from the University of Florida Press and other class expenses. The course is held one full day a week (Thursdays from 9am-4pm) and has historically begun in May.

This comprehensive and intensive Volunteer Master Gardener course covers basic botany and entomology, plant propagation, pruning, how to fertilize, how to grow vegetables, fruits, and ornamentals, landscape design, plant pest problems, among other topics.

This curriculum will help you be a better Florida gardener. Most importantly, it will enable you, working through the Extension Office, to help fellow citizens with their gardening questions as well as teach them how to be Florida-friendly gardeners.

Individuals who are accepted into the program must agree to give a minimum of 50 hours of volunteer work and receive a minimum of 8 hours of continuing education annually to remain certified as a Florida Master Gardener.

The core areas include:

Botany, entomology, pathology, soil management and plant nutrition
Cultural methods of growing garden vegetables, fruit crops, trees, plants (including annuals, perennials, ornamentals, wildlife-attracting plants, natives) and turf in Hernando County
Providing customer service
Other related programs such as Florida Yards and Neighborhoods and 4-H
The program includes classroom training via lectures, multimedia presentations and group activities.

Maintaining Master Gardener Certification

Volunteer a minimum of 50 hours a year
Areas of volunteer service include but are not limited to, staffing plant clinics, answering residents' questions on the phone or in person, maintaining demonstration gardens, assisting with displays at public venues such as the county fair, teaching youth through schools or 4-H, speaking to clubs or civic organizations, etc.
Attend Master Gardener monthly meetings, field trips and activities
Complete at least 8 hours of continuing education/training per year

To find out more about our program, download the Master Gardener PDF and contact the Pasco County Extension office at (352)521-4288.